Microsoft Build: From Windows 8.1 To Xbox

Windows 8.1 got its moment in the spotlight during Monday's Build keynote, but the real star was Microsoft's expanding ecosystem.

10 Hidden Benefits of Windows 8.1

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As promised, Microsoft on Wednesday launched a public preview of Windows 8.1. Speaking to a developer-heavy audience of 5,000, CEO Steve Ballmer introduced the update during the opening keynote at the company's Build conference in San Francisco. The venue demanded attention not only to Win8, whose Modern UI has been the subject of much criticism and debate, but also to the wider Microsoft ecosystem to which developers now have access. Ballmer and other execs largely met this dual mandate by making Win8.1 one of only several major topics discussed throughout the keynote.

Other focuses included opening Bing as a development platform, empowering developers with new tools and creating a cohesive experience across the Windows ecosystem, from smartphones to desktops.

The answer? Not really, as far as Windows 8.1 is concerned, though Microsoft execs charted new ground elsewhere. In terms of the OS update, Windows chief Julie Larson-Green took to stage mostly to review changes and enhancements that Microsoft demonstrated earlier this month at the Computex trade show in Taiwan. That said, some features -- particularly those that apply to smaller tablets, which Ballmer said he expects to thrive -- received new attention.

Larson-Green noted, for example, that when typing on most tablets' on-screen keyboards, auto-complete functions allow users to select among suggestions only by lifting their hands from the keys. This causes a break in the workflow, she argued, but Windows 8.1 corrects the problem, allowing users to choose the desired correction by sliding a hand across the space bar.

Larson-Green also previewed a version of PowerPoint for Windows RT, continuing the company's migration of its legacy software to the new platform. She also promised that all of the native apps in Windows 8.1 would be either updated or new. She also emphasized that apps are updated automatically, without user action, and that Windows 8 can instantly scale to different form factors, even resizing an application in real time as it was dragged from a tablet screen to an external -- and less pixel-dense -- monitor.

These are just a few of the many features with which Microsoft hopes to project a user-centric attitude that will help it gain traction among consumers and BYOD users. It remains to be seen if the public responds, but the updated OS appears substantially more user-friendly than the original edition. Many aspects of Larson-Green's presentation, such as animated backgrounds and improved multi-screen support for Modern apps, were familiar, but they still served to reaffirm how much Windows has changed since last fall.

Windows 8 was initially an attempt to retain Microsoft's core market of enterprise PC users while also muscling into the mobile market that iOS and Android dominate, and through which millions of iPads and other consumer devices have found their way into Windows' workplace turf. It was also an attempt to rally Microsoft's developers around new tools and new kinds of applications, and to create cohesion, for both users and programmers, across its ecosystem of products.

But things are changing. Microsoft touted touchscreens in the build-up to Win8's launch, but, as Ballmer conceded, few touchscreen devices were initially available. Now, OEMs have produced so many options that the CEO "doesn't know what kind of device to talk about." Standing in front of two tables full of Windows 8 devices, from smartphones to 27-inch mega-tablets, he concluded, "Windows devices of today look very different."

The new devices are also cheaper, as several presenters pointed out, and those with Intel's new Haswell chips offer better battery lives than devices that used previous-generation processors. Throw in the fact that smaller tablets will soon come bundled with Office, and the Windows landscape is, indeed, different.

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